Why the new dictionary of the French Academy is already so criticized by linguists

The French Academy unveiled the new edition of its dictionary on Thursday, November 14. No fewer than 21,000 words appeared, provoking contrasting reactions.

The fourth and final volume of the 9th edition of the dictionary of the Académie française was released on November 13, 2024. In total, the work now offers “53,000 words, including approximately 21,000 new words compared to the previous edition of 1935”. The French Academy aims to be a “mirror of an era that runs from 1950 to the present day and its “scientific, technical, social and cultural developments”. Among the new entries, several words come from slang: “rififi”, “zonzon”, “Saint-glinglin”. Others come from foreign languages ​​such as “risotto”, “top model” or even “sashimi”.

The “job names, functions, grades and titles” are also feminized. The integration of terms such as radiotoxicity, retinopathy, spin, tabulator, thermonuclear or xenograft also reflects ” the considerable place taken by science and technology in our daily world”. 

“Wokism” invites itself into the dictionary

Volume 4 also takes stock of the social and cultural transformations that our era is experiencing with the addition of words such as “telework”, “trek”, “transsexual”, “video protection” or “zadist”. The term “wokism” is defined as a “current of thought born in the United States in the 2000s, which advocates raising awareness of the inequalities that structure Western societies. “The introduction of words such as rugbystique, tabla or yuzu highlights the prominent place that sport occupies in our society today, as well as the influence of the arts and culinary practices that belong to “varied geographical areas”, explains the French Academy.